Brokeback Mountain

[altivo]

A couple of months ago I stated that I was declining to see Brokeback Mountain in the theater and gave my reasons. Many felt I was wrong, and I said I would look at it after the DVD came out. I have now done so, but my opinion still stands. It is no wonder that the religious right hasn't mounted a huge campaign against the film (I know, there were some objections, but nothing compared with those raised by the first Harry Potter film, for instance.) As far as I'm concerned, just like the original story upon which it was based, this film is not about gay men, it is not about homosexuality, and it is not even very interesting.

I had thought that the gay community in the US was well beyond the point of seizing upon any depiction of male-male sexuality in the general media and pointing to it as some kind of step forward. You know, the days when Midnight Cowboy, La Cage au Folles, A Very Natural Thing, Making Love or even The Gay Deceivers were viewed as important public and political statements simply because they pushed male-male relationships into the public eye. Well, it seems that I was wrong.

I found Annie Proulx's original story very sad and depressing, but I found the film adaptation to be simply disappointing or even disgusting. We do not need, in this day and age, a depiction of two men (played, of course, by actors who are straight or at least nominally so) who cannot recognize, understand, or accept their own sexuality or relationship. Nor do we need to see those two men become codependent and dysfunctional, in a setting which allows them to damage or destroy the lives of others as well as their own. Most of all, we do not need a film that depicts, as is so sadly traditional, the "punishment" of those men for their behavioral tendencies in order to make up for the sin of having admitted to their existence at all.

In spite of other reviewers who declared that Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal had given good performances as "gay men" I found their depictions lacking. They gave a performance as confused and lust-driven men at best, with no comprehension of the tenderness and love that underlies a genuine relationship. This is true to Proulx's original story, of course, so the actors are not necessarily to be faulted for what they did. The characters in the story, and in the film, are not "gay". They are not even really "homosexual" except perhaps in the sense of situational homosexuality, the lust and power driven behavior that was shown so well in Fortune and Men's Eyes. I'm not surprised, really, that Hollywood can do no better, but I believe it is way past time for some independent film maker to give us a genuinely positive depiction of a gay male relationship, played by actors who are sufficiently comfortable with their orientation to give a believable and empathic representation of the story. As far as I'm concerned, Brokeback Mountain is not such a film, nor is the original story upon which it was based a suitable platform for such a film.

I was reminded of the 1970s, when I served for a time on the committee of reviewers who selected books for the ALA GLTF Gay Book Awards. After a couple of years, we began to feel that we were simply passing out awards for "the best male homosexual death by car crash in a book published in 197-" since it seemed that every author, in order to get a novel published with genuine gay characters, had to punish at least one of them by killing him before the end of the book.

As for the present film, I can only give Brokeback Mountain a rating of one and a half apples, and that's for the scenery and cinematography. I found the script and acting disappointing in the extreme, and unworthy of even that high a rating. I managed to sit through it, but only just barely. I'm sure the anti-gay faction are quite pleased with it, since it shows just precisely the kind of misery and suffering that they believe all gay men are doomed to face, both in this life and in the afterlife.

Comments

[chibiabos.livejournal.com]

I guess my experience in gay relationships has just been very different.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Different from what? The film? My own experience?

Years ago, we distinguished between "gay" (which means self-accepting of homosexual or bisexual tendencies) and simply "homosexual" which describes a clinically diagnosable state. That distinction has faded over the last two decades as "gay" has become the shorthand used by the general English-speaking population for anything homosexual, bisexual, and involving either gender. In fact, in very recent years, I've begun to hear "gay" being used as a general-purpose insult or deprecatory word that really is no different in meaning from "fucked", "defective", "inadequate", or "messed up." (I won't digress into the origin and distortion involved in that first one.)

Given what you've told me about your past relationships, I'd be hesitant to apply the term "gay" to them, at least as I prefer to use the word. There may have been homosexuality involved, but the mutual bonding implied by "relationship" and the acceptance once intended by the word "gay" were not present, or at least not simultaneously. That's not a criticism of you personally, and I'm certainly sorry you've suffered what you have. There is more, though, than you have seen, and I am faulting film-makers for failing to recognize it and choose such a subject instead of the pathological ones.

[chibiabos.livejournal.com]

Yours seems a relationship in the minority. The whole message of the movie Brokeback Mountain, to me, was the truth -- relationships that could have done very well are destroyed not because of whether or not they love each other, not whether or not they are right for one another, but because society tells them and smashes it into their skulls that they are bad people.

You are very blessed if you've never experienced violent bigotry, though nothing is as much of a blessing as having a stable relationship lasting decades. Even a zoo relationship can't last as long, unless its with a parrot or turtle or maybe an elephant ...

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Mine is a relationship in the minority even if it were heterosexual. I'm well aware of that. Most straight marriages in the US don't last this long either. That's neither here nor there with respect to my point, though.

I've been in broken relationships too, both gay and straight. I also know quite a few long term, loving and supportive gay couples. Unfortunately, though such relationships are nowhere near as rare as they seem, they are indeed often kept low profile for their own protection which keeps them from serving as role models or examples in a very effective way.

And that's all the more reason that I think popular media, both books and film/television, should show some of them. I could even settle for a film made from one of Joseph Hansen's later mystery novels, if it were done properly (which I'm afraid would never happen, since Hansen's gay detective, Dave Brandstetter, finally settled into a relationship with not only another man, but one of another race.)

As for experiencing violent bigotry, of course I have. I was bullied and brutalized all through school, even before I had the least inkling of what it was for or about. I have been through one tumultuous and sometimes violent relationship, and another that involved clandestine cheating. And I have even had the experience of having a partner seized and targeted for a public beating by street thugs (he ended up with several stitches to the scalp) because he was perceived as "queer" while we were just walking down a public street. We picked two of the attackers from a lineup, but they were juveniles so I doubt anything effective was done about it and have no way of knowing. They had a prior record, but typically juveniles don't get effective treatment or punishment, either one.

[pogo101.livejournal.com]

I've read the short story but haven't seen the film, with similar reasons for the resistance. So this is based solely on the New Yorker story.

I guess I just disagree that the author intended to show the men as being "punished" by their (acting upon their) homo- or bisexual attraction for each other. I thought her points included (1) that anti-gay attitudes in society are what are so terribly destructive, not the attractions themselves, and (2) that these attractions and orientations often are not "chosen" in the usual sense of the word. Obviously if Ennis could have "chosen" his attractions, he'd have shut off his feelings for Jack and lived the Norman Rockwell life he'd tried to live.

Hey, things could be a lot worse. Wasn't "Cruising" a really rotten image for homosexuality? (Another film I never saw, so I can't say.)

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I agree that Annie Proulx probably intended, in part, to show that social attitudes are a major contributor to the "hell" that gay males or even bisexual males often come to experience. After two readings, I'm still not sure whether she herself thinks that is a good thing or not. One can just as easily read her story as a warning against choosing a life of wickedness or allowing oneself to be driven by lust as one can read it as a condemnation of the tortures inflicted by society upon anyone who is different from the norm, whether the difference is sexual or skin color or something else.

Unfortunately, film making usually involves a great deal of simplification and loss of nuance, and this was no exception. The film simply doesn't deliver even that ambiguous message very well, in my opinion.

I didn't see Cruising either, though I suspect that yes, it was not very helpful. That was a while back, when negative images were still pretty common. Gay men were still being depicted as natural born child molesters during prime time television too.

And I don't think it is as obvious that Ennis would have chosen differently as you seem to feel it is. I can easily look at this and say it clearly shows Ennis "refusing" to make that choice out of simple and sinful lust. That is partly because I didn't feel much love in the way in which the two men interacted at all. It really did look like simple lust to me. Another way of looking at it, in both Proulx and the film, is that Jack was a wicked tempter who "converted" Ennis to a sinful path, reinforcing yet another anti-gay stereotype beloved of the Christian right.

[chibiabos.livejournal.com]

Is that the case for anyone who attracts someone who previously was only straight? Because that was me, twice.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Is what the case? I'm not calling you or anyone else wicked or accusing anyone of "converting" people. I was just pointing out that the conservatives have always done so.

What I do think about that situation (and I have personal experiences to support that conclusion) is that it is very likely to be self-defeating and not to produce a stable or loving relationship.

[chibiabos.livejournal.com]

I managed to catch the eye of two guys (Hawk and Ebonlupus) who previously had only been in heterosexual relationships. And certainly proved not to be stable in those cases.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Yes, I knew that. But don't judge the potential of all same sex relationships based on those experiences. Obviously, that direction starts out with a significant handicap above and beyond the issue of social pressure.

[chibiabos.livejournal.com]

Certainly, mine aren't unique.

Certainly, I don't see myself as having any greater potential than repeated past history has taught me. I'm just not cut out to find and have a relationship like yours.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

No, your experience isn't unique. I never meant to imply that, but rather just that it isn't quite a typical experience either, and certainly not one from which to project universal assumptions.

[pogo101.livejournal.com]

It could be that I'm letting my understanding of the story be "improved" by what I've read outside its actual text. For example, I know that Proulx is very pro-gay-rights in the usual senses. So now I can't believe she meant anything negative, but the story itself may be less clear.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

In order to achieve mainstream publication at the time when Proulx's story first appeared, it probably had to be subtle and ambiguous.

My views on all this are probably too strongly political and derived from my own early gay liberation involvement, but I want to see something less ambiguous. And I strongly feel that gay men, just like Native Americans or blacks or hispanics, ought to be portrayed by members of their own group rather than by members of the majority who are pretending to be what they are not (and not doing so very well, in my opinion.)

[kamodragon.livejournal.com]

Music, Art, Photography, Books and Films all have different effects for different people. Films and Books are not the same and will never be. A person’s imagination and experiences in life can be let loose almost completely with a book; filling in the blanks of sorts. With a film it is all laid out in front of you without much choice.

I have seen the film three times before buying two copies of the DVD (on for the mom) and was touched every time I saw the film. Personally I think the film did a damn good job of showing REAL social issues going on at the time. The film was not shot for 2006… If I think back to the social problems going on at the period of time the filmed covered and looked at small town cowboy life, the film is quite accurate. Being a closeted gay male is never easy. Add 400 small town people, a few cowboys and the 60’s and you have a well balanced problem.

The film was not Hollywood at all. There was no unrealistic drama nor a lack of realistic problems. Both having started a family despite being gay is uber-typical of that generation of folks. Most of my older gay male friends all have kids and admit they were always gay and just did what society thought was correct.

As for the love story? Having been in love deeply before and having a loving mate now, I understand what they feel. When I had my first relationship with another male I too was confused and went back and forth in my mind weather or nor it was the right thing or if there was something I could do to change. Distance between two lovers grows the heart fonder…

My only problem with this film was when they were discussing when one of them had gone to Mexico to “fulfill” a need. I think that part may have discredited the basis of their relationship to an extent however sexual attraction and sex drive can’t wait for once a year, so I understand to an extent what that was intended to show.

Overall I think for being Gay Cinema it was the best anyone has put out in a long time…

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I really, really hesitate to call this "gay cinema." It's a film that happens to have two characters one or both of whom might have been gay under other circumstances but who were not gay in the context in which they lived.

But sure, different people react in different ways, and I'm not generally responsive to motion pictures anyway. They tend to irritate me more than they please, I don't see many of them for that reason, and my opinions are solely my own.

I don't deny that this film has had some positive effects. I do fear that it is also having negative effects that are more subtle and less visible. And as a communicating work of art, I just think it is terribly flawed.

[corelog.livejournal.com]

I haven't read the book nor seen the film. Nor was I ever really keen on seeing it. Just...wasn't on my watch list.

I find your differentiation of "gay" versus "homosexual" an interesting one. I share the differentiation, though I use different terms to mean much the same thing, but I do agree, the difference is there.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

My differentiation is admittedly artificial but it has a historical basis. Others in my age group will understand what I mean immediately, but as often happens in language, words lose their meanings. I don't know how to express my meaning here without using that distinction, and I'm not sure that in the current usages of English we even have words that carry the distinction I want. It's a problem. ;p

[typographer.livejournal.com]

I want to have two very different in-depth discussions with you on things raised in this post. I'm afraid they will start to sound like arguments, which isn't what I want to do. So I will try to limit myself to a couple observations, the first a personal one.

I cried at the movie. I was choked up for quite a bit after. Because I lived the movie. I grew up in the Rocky Mountain states. I never lived in Riverton, Wyoming, but I lived in the general area. My dad was a roughneck (oil field worker). My mom left high school to marry a roughneck. Michael, my husband, used to be a bullrider. I have lots of cultural connections to the milieu of the story. I became involved in my first relationship with another guy during the 1970s in a small rural community. And it was just as codependent and dysfunctional as theirs was (with the added complication that we were in junior high when we started). My life could have turned out like either of theirs did. And at least part of the reason it didn't is because of the dumb luck of my parents divorcing under the circumstances that they did and I was relocated to a very different community in 1976.

I think the movie is much more hopeful than the story. In the movie Ennis finally does something that doesn't disappoint someone who loves him at the end. It ain't much, but having grown up with a lot of men (admittedly, most of them straight) who were as emotionally stunted as Ennis, I recognize what an incredible break-through that was. But it is definitely a tragedy. And while anyone can project their own agenda on any work of art, I think as a tragedy its message is that the relationship didn't have to go this way, if only things had been different. And I think that's a message that needs to get out. I constantly meet so-called middle-of-the-road people who think that gay folks already have equal rights, they have the same opportunities as everyone else, society doesn't hold them back in any way, ad nauseum. They need to learn that this isn't so.

I think the distinction you draw between "homosexual" and "gay" in the comments above is so artificial and non-intuitive as to be counter-productive in all but the most academic of discussions. But I understand what you're trying to say.

And none of this should be construed to imply I think you should like the movie. I would never impose my tastes on someone else. :P

[altivo.livejournal.com]

No, I don't perceive your issues as "arguments" at all. Your points are valid, and I really don't mean in what I say to deny the validity of the cultural milieu or the experiences that are depicted. You are quite right in pointing out that they are real, even today, and that the continued existence of this situation is unacceptable.

My complaint is that the film, even moreso than the story, is simply too ambiguous to drive the point home with most viewers. Those who get it probably already understood. Those who don't get it are more likely to be grossed out or to think that it proves their own viewpoint than to be changed in any way. That and I am very, very tired of male actors taking on gay roles all the while proclaiming their own non-gayness and being lauded for their acting ability and tolerance in playing such roles. This last is a major sticking point for me. We quit tolerating men playing the roles of women centuries ago. We quit tolerating whites playing the roles of blacks many decades ago. Native Americans had to make a big fuss before they were no longer customarily portrayed by whites mimicking stereotypes. It is time for gay roles to be filled by gay actors who can make them look real rather than stilted.

The distinction between "gay" and "homosexual" that I make is a historic one, driven by the usage and politics of the 1970s. I agree with you that in current American English it rings false, but I don't know what words in current use would convey the same things. As my grandparents thought "gay" meant happy, my generation thought it meant out of the closet and unashamed. Today it is a generic for anyone of homosexual and sometimes bisexual orientation, and seems to be well on its way to becoming a pejorative that can be applied to anything, animate or inanimate, to mean simply "defective." I suppose in that sense I could agree that Brokeback Mountain is a gay film. I found it to be defective. ;) The defect is not intentional, nor is it one of actual inaccuracy. I know that the situations can indeed be real. I just don't think it is an effective message for our time, nor did it communicate effectively for me.

[typographer.livejournal.com]

Those who get it probably already understood.

This may be. I just don't know. Several years ago, when I was still involved in the Seattle Lesbian & Gay Chorus, for our Pride concert who had this section where some of the choristers were doing very short skits to give some context to the next song, and there were a number of members of the chorus who had big issues with one skit where one character talked about having to evaluate her safety any time in public she felt the urge to hold hands with her partner. The folks who objected were absolutely certain that the sorts of folks who come to our concerts already knew that.

At the "de-brief" we did at the first rehearsal after the performances, a rather large number of chorisiters all told very similar stories: how relatives or friends, who they thought were liberal and well-informed on the issue, remembered that skit most of all, and were shocked by it. "It's not really like that, is it?"

I realize that that skit was not at all ambiguous, so this doesn't address that point at all. My reason for citing it is that a lot of people who we think that they "get it" don't.

I share your irritation at all the "oh! Aren't they brave!" gushing. I disagree, slightly, with the idea that only gay actors should play gay characters. On another level, having seen the two actors in other roles, and again, having experience with men like Ennis, I have to strongly disagree that their performances weren't good. They weren't protraying the kind of characters you wanted to see in the story, but that's not the same thing. Again, this is separate from the "Aren't they brave!/What's it like to play a sex scene with another man?" et cetera. Blech!

I didn't phrase my "gay" vs "homosexual" objection well. I understand that that is the way that some people were using the terms in a particular time and place. In the late 80s/early 90s, at least out this way, the distinction was "closetted" vs "out" along with an overlapping dichotomy of "gay" vs "queer."

And I think all of them are trying to cut too fine a distinction between a lot of interrelated things. It rings as false for me as the person I knew who had been having exclusively same-sex relationships for nearly 20 years, had been living with the same partner for more than 8 years, but didn't consider himself "gay" because he was a top.

*shrug*

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Certainly, words tend to force things into neat pigeon holes that may not really be appropriate or even apply at all. But words are often all we have. "Out" vs. "closeted" doesn't mean the same thing. I have known people who were very much out of the closet but also still suffering from loads of self hate that drove them to many kinds of self-abuse and error. As for "gay" vs. "queer" all I have to say about that is that I will not use the latter. I don't buy the notion that we can appropriate an ugly epithet and make light of it, thus changing its meaning or history. I don't think it is appropriate or successful when blacks jokingly call each other "nigger" either, and in any case, such terms cannot be used by people outside the community at all because they are so laden with history.

I agree that it is all interrelated and not at all simple. And I agree that not all gay roles need be played by gay actors. But... I have yet to see this done without that "aren't they brave" symptom and somewhere the obligatory interview in which the actor denies that he is gay or has any gay experiences.

I too have known men like Ennis. I pity them for the pain and confusion they suffer, but I am not willing to let them blame it all on society alone. If I was able to recognize myself and come to terms with it in the 1960s (before Stonewall, mind) then so might they. In failing to do so, they simply show that they are nowhere near as strong as they pretend to be.

As for those who insist they aren't really gay because they are tops, well, I despise them. They have bought the worst of the stereotypes and social derision and therefore earned whatever they get for it. What they will never get is my respect.

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

I don't know if I can say that Brokeback Mountain was the first film of its type, though to me it seemed like it was the only "big" box office type film of its type. To me it wasn't overly deep or overly thought provoking but hey they were bound not to get it right first go. Before hand the only films I'd ever seen that dealt with gay/bi/lesbian issues seriously were either the smaller independant films which were used mainly as slot fillers on late night television on "culture" channels. At least it wasn't like some independant films that act like the rainbow apocolypse is coming down, those really give me the squits. I much prefer things along the lines of that comic done by K9 called "circles"

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I'd say that Brokeback Mountain is the first major film (Academy Award nominations and all that) to deal directly with the issue, head-on as it were. There have been a few others that glanced at it sideways, and lots of independent productions that few people have ever even seen.

The ones you refer to as the "Rainbow Apocalypse" are probably intended for glbt audiences primarily, to be shown at film festivals and such.

Previous mainstream attempts that didn't make as many waves (but also were flawed in various ways) would include the 1974 film A Very Natural Thing and 1982's Making Love. In 1975 we had Dog Day Afternoon in which transexual issues were raised but only peripherally. I'm sure there have been many more but those come to mind first. Still, in none of them were the glbt roles played by openly gay actors, so the significance of the real plot issues always gets buried in the publicity hoo-ha about how this one or that one agreed to take on the controversial role and so forth, even though, of course, he was NOT gay. It's quite irritating.

I'm not counting films like 1980's Cruising, which really weren't being sympathetic anyway. I should add that I'm not a big film buff anyway, and don't think much of Hollywood in general, so maybe my disgruntled attitude ought to be ignored. ;p

[pioneer11.livejournal.com]

My complaint against the film (I saw it myself) was that the families
involved seemed too enthusiastic to support Jack and Ennis. Gay or not, if
you've already got yourself a little herd you should have the courage
to deny yourself, needs or not, and raise the kids. Its not courage
to say "I'm just gay" in a marriage. Kids don't ask to be born, they
deserve at least the mom and dad that made them to be true to them.

Later, when kids are grown, maybe, but you can't burden the next
generation with your own emotional weakness. That goes for hetero
affairs too.

Obviously I prefer Ennis here in the internal world of the story, but
the story, in an attempt to make the reader/watcher sypmathetic to
the protaganists, paints the outside world a bit too starkly, a bit
too heartless.

I'd give the film a B minus. It tackles a heavy subject with some wit
and art, but not as much as you'd hope for.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I have a lot of trouble with all arguments that say you just "have" to do something, either because your body/emotion demands it or because society says you have to do it. I agree with you that these men would have owed their children and wives something more than what they apparently gave. But what they really owed was never to have gotten into that situation, society or no.

Same for the argument that they had to give in to their lust, whether gay or straight. I dont' buy it, I never have bought it, and I don't sympathize.

My biggest problem with the film is caused perhaps not by the film itself but by all the publicity and opinions about it. Everyone refers to this as a gay story, and I contend that if these two characters are gay, then they sure don't act like it, feel like it, or behave like it. Either the writing and acting is terrible or the film's claim to be a gay story is wrong.

I did not see anything I could label as "love" between Ennis and Jack. There was only the least hint of it in Proulx's original story, but there is none in the film. And without love, I can't feel much sympathy for the rest of the tale. To me they are weak and spineless, unable to either take a stand against their culture or decide to live within its demands. As such, they just can't win my respect, let alone my empathy.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm not real hip to the "gay" movement thing. It just seems to 70s to
me, too much politics derived from peoples personal needs or wants.
Can you say the Sexual Revolution is dead? With Aids? Anyway, I have
several lesbian friends, and a few gay friends that I can disagree with
on principle but they understand I'm not gonna turn them in to Karl
Rove. *facepaws* My point is that, yeah, if its /really/ about love then
just jettison it. Its not real in the first place and why should /you/
be the poster girl/boy for the "revolution". Or for that matter why
should you be the poster girl/boy for some guy that screams about
Jesus on t.v? See what I'm saying? Its about you. If /no one was
watching/ would you still love this person? Would you want to be with
them? If you can say yes...then, a good start.

I'm ranting and I can't get up!

*rolls on the floor and his staff comes by*

XD

[pioneer11.livejournal.com]

"But what they really owed was never to have gotten into that situation, society or no."

Thats the bottom line of the film. Simply because we aren't talking
about fourteen year olds wondering...these are /men/ that should,
despite any sexual questions, know shit from shineola and say, "I
love Ennis, I do love him, but..." Its like trying to say, "I didn't
/really/ mean to sign that paper for that mortgage!" I sympathize,
and I'd give them both a pass, personally, but you have to know when
the period comes in the sentence of love.

Okay that sounded like Pepe Le Pew.

*facepaws*

XD

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Well, there are valid political and social issues, and the film is intended to point them out but I think it fails. Part of the fuss about gay marriage is precisely this. Society creates forces that help perpetuate a marriage. Support lines, advantages, etc. But society does just the opposite for a gay relationship.

People point to the supposed failure rate of gay relationships (ignoring the hetero divorce rate, which is just as bad when you come down to it) as the reason that gay marriage can't be real. Yet I've been in a stable relationship for 24 years, and have many friends who have been together 30 years or more. There would be a lot more such stable couples, who do indeed contribute heavily to society as a whole, if they were recognized and encouraged to remain together. The truth is, we are teaching people to fail at relationships. They are bombarded from all sides with evidence that stable relationships are difficult or impossible. That's true for the straights too. This ought to be changed.